Experts Question Safety of E-Cigarettes

Electronic cigarettes, or “e-cigarettes,” are crude drug delivery systems for refined nicotine that pose unknown risks, two experts write in this week’s New England Journal of Medicine. Researchers from the American Legacy Foundation’s Steven A. Schroeder National Institute for Tobacco Research and Policy Studies write that e-cigarettes have more in common with asthma inhalers than with cigarettes, according to Science Daily.

E-cigarettes are designed to deliver nicotine in the form of a vapor, which is inhaled by the user. They usually have a rechargeable, battery-operated heating element, a replaceable cartridge with nicotine or other chemicals and a device called an atomizer that converts the contents of the cartridge into a vapor when heated.  E-cigarettes often are made to look like regular cigarettes.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced in April that it would regulate e-cigarettes as tobacco products, not as drug-delivery devices.

Last year, the FDA lost a court case after it tried to treat e-cigarettes as drug-delivery devices, which must satisfy stricter requirements than tobacco products, including clinical trials to prove they are safe and effective. FDA tests found that the liquid in some e-cigarettes contained toxins besides nicotine, as well as cancer-causing substances found in tobacco. Some public health experts say the level of the cancer-causing agents is similar to those found in nicotine replacement therapy, which contains nicotine extracted from tobacco.

The authors list several safety concerns about e-cigarettes. They note that the devices do not reliably deliver nicotine, and have not been sufficiently studied in the same way the FDA requires other smoking-cessation drugs and devices to be evaluated. Therefore, smokers who try to use e-cigarettes to help them quit smoking are likely to find them ineffective because of their variable nicotine content and unreliable delivery, they say.

They also note that smokers may use e-cigarettes in places where traditional tobacco smoking is not allowed, thus encouraging them to keep smoking instead of quitting. E-cigarettes also may become a smoking “starter” product for young people. E-cigarette cartridges can be bought over the Internet with flavors such as chocolate and grape, they write.